This is a flag known by some as the Black Banner. The flag contains two parts of the shahada, an Arabic declaration of Islamic faith which asserts that Allah is the one true God and that Muhammad is his prophet.

CNN didn't look close enough, though. On Saturday it ran this report on the disturbing "ISIS flag" which was spotted by its international assignment editor Lucy Pawle.

"This man dressed in black and white was waving what appears to be a very bad mimicry, but a very clear attempt to mimic the ISIS flag," Pawle said, as her face was shown next to a flag with a bunch of phallic sex toys on it.